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Once again I’ve managed to let quite a long time pass between blog posts; sorry about that. I hope to do better over the next few months, for two reasons: I’m nearly done with my first draft of Avenger, and I’ve gotten past a whole battery of right-to-the-last-minute projects here in the office, and feel like I might be on top of my schedule for a little while. My latest effort is a brand-new adventure for low-level characters that’ll be coming out in a few months; I’ll say more about it when I can!

D&D: Thinking about [i]
I guess I’m a bit of a dinosaur, because even though I love 4th Edition, I find myself really wishing that the “magic-users” – specifically, the arcane casters – were a little more impressive. I think it’s especially true for the wizard, because dispersed damage is way less effective than concentrated damage. Wizards really lag against solo monsters, and there comes a point in every encounter where it becomes a solo fight, because the gradual disappearance of enemies reduces the wizard’s ability to take advantage of his multi-targeting powers. Anyway, here’s a little idea I’ve been noodling around with: Convert wizard spells (and warlock and sorcerer spells too, I suppose) to [i] damage, and set them up to work much like the [W] damage model weapon-users follow.
    Now, as I said, I think the wizard feels under-offensed and over-defensed. We’ll work on the first part of that with our “weapon chart” for the wizard. I think it could look something like this:

Wand    +3 proficiency        I = 1d6
Staff    +2 proficiency        I = 1d8, brutal 1
Orb    +2 proficiency        I = 1d8, high crit
Rod    +2 proficiency        I = 1d10

Powers that deal a number of dice of damage deal a number of [i] instead, except that powers dealing 2d4 just count for one [i] per pair of d4’s.

Anyway, it’s a flat-out power-up for implement-wielding arcane characters. They’ll hit more often and do more damage. But that would tickle my fancy because I’d like to think that the arcane spellcasters are more accurate than common sword-swingers. To make up for that, I might tax the hit points or defenses of the implement-users… which would help to highlight the differences in roles, and make defenders feel more special.


War at Sea
Now for some War at Sea news… we’ve received our copy of the “paint masters” for Flank Speed (set 3). It’s a very nice-looking set! When we get in the final draft from China, it comes in something we call a “cake box” (mostly because it looks like something you’d buy a half-sheet cake in at Sam’s Club). Overall, I’m very happy with the miniatures and their paint jobs. I’m hoping that we see some tighter painting in the production of this set; I felt that Task Force had a lot of very nice sculpts that were hamstrung by mediocre painting, and we’ve worked hard to try to make it better.
   I’ve also been reviewing our CAD “sculpts” for the first round of Set IV, and they look to be off to a good start. Set IV rounds out the French navy, so we’ve got a couple of French aircraft on the way.


Warning, Politics Ahead
This is your fair warning that I’m about to leave the realm of gaming altogether and talk about a political issue that’s bothering me. If you’re just annoyed when some celebrity rams his or her politics down your throat—as I often am—then stop reading here, and we’ll call it good. I don’t think I’m much of a celebrity, but I’ve got a little soapbox here, and this one’s bugging me enough that I want to encourage people who see things the way I do to speak out, too.

Here it is: I think the proposed cap-and-trade plan to combat climate change is a terrible idea. The proposed scheme is a gigantic tax hike that won’t actually affect the amount of CO2 released into the atmosphere. I’ll admit that I’m dubious about global warming alarmism—or at least not very optimistic about our ability to affect ongoing climate change—but even if I weren’t, I would certainly want to see a plan implemented that might actually *affect* CO2 levels and wouldn’t cost so much darned money. Here are my specific objections:
1. No carbon-free energy production capacity currently exists for power companies/fuel companies to switch over to. Therefore, cap-and-trade won’t actually shift people away from carbon-producing fuels until those alternatives exist. Until they do, cap-and-trade won’t alter our CO2 emissions.
2. Energy and fuel companies punished by cap-and-trade will simply pass their increased costs on to us, the consumers. In effect, cap-and-trade won’t impact Big Energy or Big Oil at all. It will instead manifest itself as a brutal tax on energy production and fuel use. Anything you buy that is manufactured or moved in the US will be subject to that price hike.
3. This “tax” will be highly regressive (or exactly flat, depending on your point of view) in that it will apply to food costs, utility bills, clothing, all the stuff that everyone has to buy. It’ll hit poor people just as hard as rich people.
4. It won’t have any effect at all on China. There is simply no way that China will deny itself the use of its immense coal deposits. In fact, just recently China asserted the position that countries that buy goods manufactured in China should pay the carbon costs for China (in other words, “We’re not going to change a darned thing, but feel free to knock yourselves out.” And if our carbon mitigation measures don’t include China, then they’re going to be absolutely pointless, because China will take up all our “slack” in theoretically reduced emissions, and more.

My own suggestion would be to build the alternatives first. Announce 50 new nuclear power plants—they’re far more likely to make a substantial dent in carbon emissions than solar power or wind power. Why this isn’t Step 1 of our stimulus, I can’t imagine. Fund a “moon shot” for fusion power, battery technology, or affordable solar panel manufacturing. Those are things we could be doing to change our energy sources. When the moon shot comes in, now you’ve got something competitive you can sell to China. Cap-and-trade just doesn’t make sense as proposed.

Anyway, if you feel as I do about this plan, I urge you to write your congressman and senators. When enough people get riled up to say something, even our Congress finally begins to take note. But that means that a *lot* of us have got to be willing to take ten minutes and let our elected representatives know what we think.

That’s it for now – thanks for sticking with me this far.

MUAHHAAHAHA!!!

EXCELLENT! Looking forward to round out the French. The carrier would be cool, but I hope to see some more surface ships! Oh, and of course the aircraft too!

I think 50 new nuc plants is a great start.

We've been trying to pay more attention to turret comparisons in the new Set 3 and Set 4 sculpts. We can't really do much about turrets for "reprints," so the Prince of Wales in set 3 has the same physical components as the KG V did in set 2. But on the bright side, the Prince of Wales has a very nice new paint job with a Royal Navy dazzle pattern of light gray, dark gray, and a splash or two of green.

I didn't mention this in my blog post, but I should say it: Not only have I seen the "cake box," I've also got my full-set designer's copy. It's one of each mini in the set (hey, it's good to work at WotC!). These aren't paint masters or a special first-shot run, they're the actual production run for the set. I haven't pored over them yet, but at a glance they look pretty good.

I agree with the points that you made about our energy policy. I know it is a slight tangent, but when I see television ads that say things like "energy companies, we demand usable sources of hydrogen next year" and similar unrealistic drivel, I get iritated. I think it is sad how much of the population is fearfully ignorant of nuclear technology and how safe/effective it would be to produce massive amounts of energy. The ideas that some have that we can still do whatever we want and planting a tree erases the consequences is absurd. (Not to mention that many of the companies that sell trees for "carbon credits" use donated trees to produce packaging for their products).

I've not posted in your forum yet. I've been reading it and I'm a big fan and I'm glad to see that when you "step on your soapbox" you actually have something intelligent to say about an issue, rather than just trying to inspire blind obediance to a particular party/candidate. Keep up the good work!

By the way, please take a look at this thread when you get a chance:
http://forums.gleemax.com/showthread.ph … st18774678

I wanted to give you a heads up that you have been called out.